


cognitive dissonance

by badbrains



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: POV Gavin Reed, Pre-Slash, some tasteful introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-11
Updated: 2021-03-11
Packaged: 2021-03-18 01:55:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29975628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/badbrains/pseuds/badbrains
Summary: There’s an unwritten set of deviant behaviors that you are expected to avoid when you become a detective.
Relationships: Connor & Gavin Reed, Connor/Gavin Reed
Comments: 2
Kudos: 18





	cognitive dissonance

**Author's Note:**

> taking a second to pop my head out of my teen wolf hole to write a fanfic for a fandom i have not been in since 2018
> 
> just ... this is just a self-indulgent thing i wanted to write idk if i will write anything else convin or dbh related since i’m not as familiar with the characterizations and stuff anymore so just LET ME HAVE THIS LMAO kjhafsjkhjhasf
> 
> i struggled with whether or not to refer to connor as “it” or “he” from gavin’s perspective, but i settled on “he” because that was easier for the flow 
> 
> anyway no beta or anything please do not @ me

There’s an unwritten set of deviant behaviors that you are expected to avoid when you become a detective. 

Obviously, no criminal misconduct, neither in nor out of uniform. They teach you red flags. Red flag number one: sociopathy. No sexual harassment or assault - though, in his time on the force, Gavin has seen his fair share of cases swept under the rug save for a few unremarkable location transfers. Cut and dry, no trial, no justice. No drug abuse or alcoholism - Gavin looks up from where he is thumbing mindlessly through a case file, watches as Hank stumbles through the doors to his desk, disheveled and grumbling nonsense under his breath. He feels a mean smirk curl at the corners of his lips; they’re currently batting zero, it seems. 

In any formal career field, you are held to a certain standard of professionalism. One of those unspoken standards of the DPD being: if you do not particularly like another agent, you must grit your teeth and _take it_ or else you risk the accuracy and efficiency in which you turn out cases. A successful outcome is preferable. 

Gavin would relate his initial feelings toward android deviance in a way that could be analogous to religious agnosticism - perhaps it is unknowable whether they can feel, whether they can be held to some base level of humanity, whether who they are is authentic rather than a carefully learned set of behaviors mimicked by a meticulously programmed algorithm. 

Either way, he didn’t really give a fuck. 

But, when Captain Fowler briefed them on a new CyberLife prototype subsequently leading to Hank acquiring an android-shaped shadow, Gavin’s opinions began to shift. 

The thing is, Connor is a _good_ detective. The thought makes Gavin roll his shoulders out and scoff to himself - he fucking hopes the heap of machinery is good at solving cases, after all, it is the one thing he is made for. He’s a _robot_.

At first, he didn’t like that Connor tried so hard - he is designed to perform a task, to come in, do what he is asked to do, then power off for the day. Wash, rinse, repeat. He didn’t like that Connor brought him coffee, that he tried to smile, tried to crack jokes and learned Hank’s favorite band and family history so that he could make interesting conversation to fill budding silences. He didn’t like that he spoke lightly with calculating eyes, that he stated morbid things like he was talking about the weather, that he assimilated so well with the rest of the team even though he had no idea how to relate, got all of his information from a spinning LED and a porcelain-white hand. 

Androids always have this uncomfortable level of attractiveness to them, which is in some ways understandable since they are intended to be peak performance: smarter than you, better looking than you, more efficient than you. That is why people buy them in the first place, they are _better_ but not _equal_.

Connor is baby-faced, smooth and doe-eyed, he talks light and remains generally unimposing. He is good-looking, but he isn’t _real_.

That said, Connor solves cases faster than even the most seasoned detectives. He is quicker at running information, has an instant-acting, built-in forensic analysis system that turns a lengthy process into a customary task spanning just minutes. It is as impressive as it is infuriating. While Gavin does not hate it, not exactly, he does fear it. He looks at Connor and he is overwhelmed with the thought _this thing is better than me._ Quickly, too quickly, that thought morphs into _this thing is going to take my job one day._ So, he doesn’t hate androids. He mourns what he is going to lose to androids. 

There are a set of deviant behaviors he has spent his stint as a detective avoiding. He thinks about this sometimes, twirls his pen idly, stares unseeingly at his computer screen and just thinks. Because as Connor trails behind Hank, talking about their dog and what was on the news this morning, Gavin compares what he has had to avoid to what Connor has had to avoid. 

No empathy. Connor has to come in, witness cases of android-specific crime, busted up machines shaking and recalling events with so much _emotion_ that it almost leaves Gavin feeling shaky. But, he cannot react with anything other than cold silence, cannot react with anything that ends in any way other than a dead android or a jailed android. There really is no justice when it comes to these cases, at least not in any human connotation of the term. Because to CyberLife, justice is not so binary as right and wrong. Justice is snuffing out any machine that has any inkling of pseudo-consciousness, lest they lose their cash cow. 

Connor is a good detective, but first and foremost, he is a mercenary. He can smile and make coffee and develop inside jokes with the department’s receptionist, but at the end of the day, he is still deadlier with a gun than any of them. Is still obligated to complete his mission: kill all deviants. 

But, over the months of working together, Gavin has noticed things. Connor doesn’t like pop music with too much bass, he doesn’t understand sarcasm yet tries his damndest to emulate it, he works hard to please Hank in some sort of sought-out desire for paternal approval.

Gavin brought it up, once, made a throwaway comment more for the superficial upkeep of his anti-android rhetoric that has become a running joke rather than an outward display of unnecessary cruelty. Something about Freud and a father-complex - it was not his best work, not by a long shot. It doesn’t normally take too much to rile Connor, though. 

He began some spiel about Freud and his contributions to modern psychology’s vast development - something that Gavin cut off with a haughty scoff and an eyeroll. He said, “We get it, you’re so _smart_.”

Connor’s LED had swirled yellow, spun around and around - and Gavin waited. Because, if anything, it is always entertaining to watch Connor talk himself in circles. 

The android tilted his head, eyes narrowed. “According to my database, smart means _having or showing quick-witted intelligence_. In this connotation, _smart_ would be a compliment, typically used in a way indicative of positive affirmation. But, when compared to the overlay of your tone and sentence syntax, you are suggesting _smart_ as it is known in a derogatory sense. I understand your sarcasm, detective.”

Gavin just smirked. “You do, huh?”

Connor does things that hint at a certain extent of humanness that should not be achievable for a goddamn machine. 

No empathy. No emotion. He has seen it, though. Has watched Connor frown when Hank steals quick swigs from a shining flask. Sees his lips tug up slightly at the mention of Sumo, at the mention of any dog, really. His eyes go sad at deviant case files. It’s - he seems so _human,_ sometimes. It doesn’t make any sense. 

Connor is scary. The fingers that twirl coins in a quirky foray into awkwardness have pulled the trigger, have delivered more kill shots than Gavin can count on both hands. There is always an element of _what if_ to his actions - _what if he is a deviant, what if this is just how androids are, what if there is nothing going on inside of him, nothing at all, what if this is just an experiment to see how much it takes for a human being to deem something else_ human _._

He has no reservations about killing if it means the successful completion of a CyberLife assignment. He can ride shotgun with Hank and coo about dogs, but at the end of the day, what does life mean to an inanimate object? 

Where Connor is non-threatening, friendly to the point of nearly becoming a pushover, he is also more lethal than anyone else in the department. Possesses an unrivaled success ratio and the means of avoiding the pesky limitations of emotional awareness that has stopped too many detectives from being able to do what needs to be done. 

Connor is a machine, but maybe that isn’t a bad thing. Maybe that is not something that should be loathed, something that should encourage bias. Because, more and more lately, it seems that the thing Gavin should have hated all along is his own humanity. His own inability to shut it off. 

Gavin was taught to avoid deviant behaviors for the long-term success of his career. He hears Connor laugh at something Hank says, a beat late and a register off. He closes his eyes, opens them, and gets to work. 

**Author's Note:**

> cognitive dissonance - _refers to when a person holds contradictory beliefs, ideas, or values, and is typically experienced as psychological stress when they participate in an action that goes against one or more of them._


End file.
